Treasure Island
In the Enemy’s Camp
THE red of the torch, up the of the house, me the of my realized. The were in of the house and stores: there was the of cognac, there were the and bread, as before, and what my horror, not a of any prisoner. I only judge that all had perished, and my me that I had not been there to with them.
There were six of the buccaneers, all told; not another man was left alive. Five of them were on their feet, and swollen, called out of the sleep of drunkenness. The had only upon his elbow; he was pale, and the blood-stained his told that he had been wounded, and still more dressed. I the man who had been and had among the in the great attack, and not that this was he.
The sat, her plumage, on Long John’s shoulder. He himself, I thought, looked and more than I was used to. He still the in which he had his mission, but it was the for wear, with and with the of the wood.
“So,” said he, “here’s Jim Hawkins, my timbers! Dropped in, like, eh? Well, come, I take that friendly.”
And he sat across the and to a pipe.
“Give me a of the link, Dick,” said he; and then, when he had a good light, “That’ll do, lad,” he added; “stick the in the heap; and you, gentlemen, yourselves to! You needn’t up for Mr. Hawkins; he’ll you, you may to that. And so, Jim”—stopping the tobacco—“here you were, and a for old John. I see you were when I set my on you, but this here away from me clean, it do.”
To all this, as may be well supposed, I no answer. They had set me with my against the wall, and I there, looking Silver in the face, enough, I hope, to all appearance, but with black in my heart.
Silver took a or two of his pipe with great and then ran on again.
“Now, you see, Jim, so be as you are here,” says he, “I’ll give you a piece of my mind. I’ve always liked you, I have, for a of spirit, and the of my own self when I was and handsome. I always wanted you to and take your share, and die a gentleman, and now, my cock, you’ve got to. Cap’n Smollett’s a seaman, as I’ll own up to any day, but on discipline. ‘Dooty is dooty,’ says he, and right he is. Just you keep clear of the cap’n. The doctor himself is gone again you—‘ungrateful scamp’ was what he said; and the and the long of the whole is about here: you can’t go to your own lot, for they won’t have you; and without you start a third ship’s company all by yourself, which might be lonely, you’ll have to with Cap’n Silver.”
So so good. My friends, then, were still alive, and though I the truth of Silver’s statement, that the party were at me for my desertion, I was more than by what I heard.
“I don’t say nothing as to your being in our hands,” Silver, “though there you are, and you may to it. I’m all for argyment; I good come out o’ threatening. If you like the service, well, you’ll jine; and if you don’t, Jim, why, you’re free to answer no—free and welcome, shipmate; and if can be said by seaman, my sides!”
“Am I to answer, then?” I asked with a very voice. Through all this talk, I was to the threat of death that me, and my and my in my breast.
“Lad,” said Silver, “no one’s a-pressing of you. Take your bearings. None of us won’t you, mate; time goes so in your company, you see.”
“Well,” says I, a bolder, “if I’m to choose, I I have a right to know what’s what, and why you’re here, and where my friends are.”
“Wot’s wot?” one of the in a growl. “Ah, he’d be a lucky one as that!”
“You’ll your till you’re spoke to, my friend,” Silver to this speaker. And then, in his tones, he to me, “Yesterday morning, Mr. Hawkins,” said he, “in the dog-watch, came Doctor Livesey with a flag of truce. Says he, ‘Cap’n Silver, you’re out. Ship’s gone.’ Well, maybe we’d been taking a glass, and a song to help it round. I won’t say no. Leastways, none of us had looked out. We looked out, and by thunder, the old ship was gone! I a pack o’ look fishier; and you may to that, if I tells you that looked the fishiest. ‘Well,’ says the doctor, ‘let’s bargain.’ We bargained, him and I, and here we are: stores, brandy, house, the you was to cut, and in a manner of speaking, the whole boat, from cross-trees to kelson. As for them, they’ve tramped; I don’t know where’s they are.”
He again at his pipe.
“And you should take it into that of yours,” he on, “that you was in the treaty, here’s the last word that was said: ‘How many are you,’ says I, ‘to leave?’ ‘Four,’ says he; ‘four, and one of us wounded. As for that boy, I don’t know where he is, him,’ says he, ‘nor I don’t much care. We’re about of him.’ These was his words.
“Is that all?” I asked.
“Well, it’s all that you’re to hear, my son,” returned Silver.
“And now I am to choose?”
“And now you are to choose, and you may to that,” said Silver.
“Well,” said I, “I am not such a but I know well what I have to look for. Let the come to the worst, it’s little I care. I’ve too many die since I in with you. But there’s a thing or two I have to tell you,” I said, and by this time I was excited; “and the is this: here you are, in a way—ship lost, lost, men lost, your whole gone to wreck; and if you want to know who did it—it was I! I was in the apple the night we land, and I you, John, and you, Dick Johnson, and Hands, who is now at the of the sea, and told every word you said the hour was out. And as for the schooner, it was I who cut her cable, and it was I that killed the men you had of her, and it was I who her where you’ll see her more, not one of you. The laugh’s on my side; I’ve had the top of this from the first; I no more you than I a fly. Kill me, if you please, or me. But one thing I’ll say, and no more; if you me, are bygones, and when you are in for piracy, I’ll save you all I can. It is for you to choose. Kill another and do yourselves no good, or me and keep a to save you from the gallows.”
I stopped, for, I tell you, I was out of breath, and to my wonder, not a man of them moved, but all sat at me like as many sheep. And while they were still staring, I out again, “And now, Mr. Silver,” I said, “I you’re the best man here, and if go to the worst, I’ll take it of you to let the doctor know the way I took it.”
“I’ll it in mind,” said Silver with an so that I not, for the life of me, decide he were laughing at my or had been by my courage.
“I’ll put one to that,” the old mahogany-faced seaman—Morgan by name—whom I had in Long John’s public-house upon the of Bristol. “It was him that Black Dog.”
“Well, and see here,” added the sea-cook. “I’ll put another again to that, by thunder! For it was this same boy that the from Billy Bones. First and last, we’ve upon Jim Hawkins!”
“Then here goes!” said Morgan with an oath.
And he up, his knife as if he had been twenty.
“Avast, there!” Silver. “Who are you, Tom Morgan? Maybe you you was cap’n here, perhaps. By the powers, but I’ll teach you better! Cross me, and you’ll go where many a good man’s gone you, and last, these thirty year back—some to the yard-arm, my timbers, and some by the board, and all to the fishes. There’s a man looked me the and a good day a’terwards, Tom Morgan, you may to that.”
Morgan paused, but a rose from the others.
“Tom’s right,” said one.
“I long from one,” added another. “I’ll be if I’ll be by you, John Silver.”
“Did any of you want to have it out with me?” Silver, from his position on the keg, with his pipe still in his right hand. “Put a name on what you’re at; you ain’t dumb, I reckon. Him that wants shall it. Have I this many years, and a son of a his my at the end of it? You know the way; you’re all o’ fortune, by your account. Well, I’m ready. Take a cutlass, him that dares, and I’ll see the colour of his inside, and all, that pipe’s empty.”
0267m
Not a man stirred; not a man answered.
“That’s your sort, is it?” he added, returning his pipe to his mouth. “Well, you’re a to look at, anyway. Not much to fight, you ain’t. P’r’aps you can King George’s English. I’m cap’n here by ’lection. I’m cap’n here I’m the best man by a long sea-mile. You won’t fight, as o’ should; then, by thunder, you’ll obey, and you may to it! I like that boy, now; I a boy than that. He’s more a man than any pair of of you in this here house, and what I say is this: let me see him that’ll a hand on him—that’s what I say, and you may to it.”
There was a long pause after this. I up against the wall, my still going like a sledge-hammer, but with a of now in my bosom. Silver against the wall, his arms crossed, his pipe in the of his mouth, as as though he had been in church; yet his furtively, and he the of it on his followers. They, on their part, together the end of the house, and the low of their in my ear continuously, like a stream. One after another, they would look up, and the red light of the would for a second on their faces; but it was not me, it was Silver that they their eyes.
“You to have a to say,” Silver, into the air. “Pipe up and let me it, or to.”
“Ax your pardon, sir,” returned one of the men; “you’re free with some of the rules; maybe you’ll keep an upon the rest. This crew’s dissatisfied; this don’t a marlin-spike; this has its like other crews, I’ll make so free as that; and by your own rules, I take it we can talk together. I ax your pardon, sir, you for to be at this present; but I my right, and steps for a council.”
And with an sea-salute, this fellow, a long, ill-looking, yellow-eyed man of five and thirty, the door and out of the house. One after another the his example, each making a as he passed, each adding some apology. “According to rules,” said one. “Forecastle council,” said Morgan. And so with one or another all out and left Silver and me alone with the torch.
The sea-cook his pipe.
“Now, look you here, Jim Hawkins,” he said in a that was no more than audible, “you’re a of death, and what’s a long worse, of torture. They’re going to me off. But, you mark, I by you through thick and thin. I didn’t to; no, not till you spoke up. I was about to that much blunt, and be into the bargain. But I see you was the right sort. I says to myself, you by Hawkins, John, and Hawkins’ll by you. You’re his last card, and by the thunder, John, he’s yours! Back to back, says I. You save your witness, and he’ll save your neck!”
I to understand.
“You all’s lost?” I asked.
“Aye, by gum, I do!” he answered. “Ship gone, gone—that’s the size of it. Once I looked into that bay, Jim Hawkins, and no schooner—well, I’m tough, but I gave out. As for that and their council, mark me, they’re and cowards. I’ll save your life—if so be as I can—from them. But, see here, Jim—tit for tat—you save Long John from swinging.”
I was bewildered; it a thing so he was asking—he, the old buccaneer, the ringleader throughout.
“What I can do, that I’ll do,” I said.
“It’s a bargain!” Long John. “You speak up plucky, and by thunder, I’ve a chance!”
He to the torch, where it among the firewood, and took a fresh light to his pipe.
“Understand me, Jim,” he said, returning. “I’ve a on my shoulders, I have. I’m on squire’s now. I know you’ve got that ship safe somewheres. How you done it, I don’t know, but safe it is. I Hands and O’Brien soft. I much in neither of them. Now you mark me. I ask no questions, I won’t let others. I know when a game’s up, I do; and I know a that’s staunch. Ah, you that’s young—you and me might have done a power of good together!”
He some from the into a cannikin.
“Will you taste, messmate?” he asked; and when I had refused: “Well, I’ll take a myself, Jim,” said he. “I need a caulker, for there’s trouble on hand. And talking o’ trouble, why did that doctor give me the chart, Jim?”
My a wonder so that he saw the of questions.
“Ah, well, he did, though,” said he. “And there’s something under that, no doubt—something, surely, under that, Jim—bad or good.”
And he took another of the brandy, his great like a man who looks to the worst.
